Are you feeling special today? Underwear and the ‘fashioning’ of female identity

Abstract

This paper explores underwear – a neglected (at least by academic literature) aspect of clothing – and the ways it is implicated in the (re)production of women's identities. Although underwear is ostensibly hidden from view, as part of women's clothing, we argue that it functions as a resource for identity construction. We present data from three focus groups to discuss some of the socio-psychological reasons for choosing and wearing the ‘right’ underwear. The analysis is based on three themes: the significance respondents attribute to underwear according to whether it is hidden or visible; the sensations it induces for the wearer; and the varying mobilisations of underwear to support aspects of the female identity project. We argue that underwear can be seen as a technique of the body or a technology of the self and that a woman ‘learns’ through the embodied experience of wearing different underwear how to (re)construct various elements of her identity.

Keywords:

• female identity project
• identity construction
• identity opseis
• techniques of the body
• technologies of the self
• underwear

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank the three anonymous Culture and Organization reviewers for their helpful and constructive advice, and also the journal editors for their patience in awaiting our revised manuscript.

Notes

Singular of opseis.

To briefly clarify the protocol used in reproducing these extracts from the data, ‘Abby-1’ is an example of the pseudonyms given to each respondent. The number (here 1) refers to the focus group in which each took part. ‘Int’ refers to Author A as the interviewer/facilitator. [...] signifies either edited text or text having been removed. Two dots without parentheses signify a short pause, whereas three signify a longer pause, or an interruption by other respondents if at the end of a sentence. Finally, italics are used to indicate verbal emphasis.

As shown in Table 1, Wendy is not British; hence her query here.

Here Wendy is referring to one of the stimulus pictures where the model is wearing an underwired balcony bra and a pair of bikini garter knickers.

Kelly is pointing to a stimulus picture where the model is wearing a variation on boy pants.

Kerry's husband.